Anonymous Story: Laws Can’t Protect You

I met a man online twice my age over the summer. He was handsome, charming, and supposedly everything I could ask for. Unfortunately, I didn’t know how much looks can be decieveing. I had just begun dating for the first time when we met and wasn’t able to offer him the sexual relationship that he wanted, so I decided to cut contact.

A few days ago I saw him again on a dating app and wanted to see if we could try dating again. We decided to meet at his house one night. When I got there, I took multiple shots, which made me feel drowsy almost immediately, and then he lead me to his room. While in bed, he asked me to turn around and get on my hands and knees, and I did.

After a minute or so I blacked out. I came to when I saw a flash go off. I immediately turned around and saw him on his phone taking photos of me. When I asked him why he was taking photos, he said I gave him permission to. I never gave him permission. He never asked and even if he had, I would never agree to do so. I started to cry and begged him to delete the photos he took because I didn’t want them to ruin my career. He just laughed and said I didn’t have a fucking career. After that I blacked out again.

When I awoke later that night, I asked him about the photos again and threatened to break his phone if he didn’t delete them. He told me that he did delete them and showed me his phone. Later on that night I asked him did he take photos of me again and he told me he never took any photos. Again later on I asked him to delete the photos and he told me he did take photos but deleted them and showed me his phone again. His story changed multiple times that night and later on the next day through text also.

The next day I decided to text him and ask him again, since I was now in the proper state of mind, did he take photos of me. He didn’t text me back that day, which made me suspicious since he had always texted back before. I decided to text him again later asking him to delete any photos he took and told him I would press charges against him if he didn’t. He told me the photos were a “wonderful continuation of the wonderful night we shared together”.

He had no sympathy for me. He knew I was drunk and in a vulnerable state so he waited until I couldn’t stop him to take advantage of my body. I feel disgusted knowing that I let this man touch me. He laughed why I was crying and begging him not to take photos of me and then called it a wonderful night.

He eventually did assure me through texts that he didn’t take any photos/deleted any photos and I felt happy for a few days. I’m not sure why, but in the middle of the night I got a horrible feeling about the situation and about him and decided to look him up online. I found that multiple women have made complaints about him online for cheating on his wife, lying about having children, and lying about his age. On dating apps he claims to be 44, but I found out he’s actually in his late fifties. I thought it was ironic that he told me he wanted to get to know me, but he didn’t even have the decency to tell me how old he actually was. The women claimed that he cheated on his wife years ago with multiple women and recently one woman claimed that he was harassing her by sending her pornographic messages.

Hearing that he was harassing a women made me link clues together. When we had first started talking, he was kicked off the dating app we met on. Profiles are only deleted after dozens of complaints are made against you, which means most likely he was harassing women. This woman made this complaint approx. 3 months later from when his profile was deleted, so she might’ve been one of the women he was harassing on the app initially.

Because of what I found online, I couldn’t trust his word. I can’t trust that he would’ve actually deleted the photos, so I went to the police station to file a complaint. The police basically told me that there was nothing that could be done because in order to have his phone searched, I would’ve had to call the police at the time it was happening. In my eyes, the police told me that a man can get you drunk, remove your clothes, and take photos of you without your consent, and unless you call the police during (which is difficult while intoxicated), no crime was committed. I was told that there was no crime to report, but the officer gave me a case number anyways. Knowing that someone could take advantage of you like this made me feel sick. There’s no law protecting women from being exposed online by disgusting men like him.

I strongly regret not looking him up before I went to his house that night. Now he has compromising photos of me and I can do nothing about it. I’m sharing this story to warn others to be careful about meeting men online. Please look them up before going to meet them and please don’t get intoxicated unless you feel you’re in a safe environment. He did an amazing job at coning me into bed and using me like he has many other women in the past.

*** Name redacted ***